The Washington Post calls me “an influential health-care wonk at the libertarian Cato Institute,” where I am the director of health policy studies. The New Republic says I'm "Obamacare's Single Most Relentless Antagonist." The Hill says I'm one of “the 100 People to Watch.” I am the co-editor of Replacing Obamacare: The Cato Institute on Health Care Reform (Cato, 2013) and coauthor of Healthy Competition: What’s Holding Back Health Care and How to Free It (Cato, 2013). Though not a Republican, I served as a domestic policy analyst for the U.S. Senate Republican Policy Committee, advising the Senate leadership on health, education, labor, welfare, and the Second Amendment. I have appeared on ABC, CBS, CNN, CNBC, C-SPAN, Fox News Channel, and NPR. My work has been featured in The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, USA Today, the Los Angeles Times, the New York Post, the Chicago Tribune, the Chicago Sun-Times, the San Francisco Chronicle, Huffington Post, Forum for Health Economics & Policy, Health Matrix: Journal of Law-Medicine, and the Yale Journal of Health Policy, Law, and Ethics. I've got a bachelor’s degree in American government (B.A.) from the University of Virginia, and master’s degrees in economics (M.A.) and law & economics (J.M.) from George Mason University. Click “Follow” next to my photo (above) to receive notices of some of the most important analysis of ObamaCare and beyond.

I’ll be able to dig up some e-mails…from people who made up their mind that they don’t want [the Affordable Care Act] to work because they don’t like the president. Maybe he’s of the wrong color, something of that sort. I’ve seen a lot of that and I know a lot of that to be true.

USA Today and the Washington Post each reported that Rockefeller was just saying publicly what many Democrats say privately. “It’s only a part,” Rockefeller was quoted in the Post. “But it is a part of life, and it is a part of American life and world life, and it’s a part of — just a part — of why they oppose absolutely everything that this president does.”

I agree with Rockefeller. No doubt there are some Americans who oppose everything the president does, including ObamaCare, because he is black. And no doubt Rockefeller has seen a lot of, you know, “that.” As someone who represented West Virginia in the U.S. Senate for 25 years alongside former Klansman and fellow Democrat Robert C. Byrd, Rockefeller is no doubt aware that racism is not confined to any one political party.

Dean of the US Senate Robert Byrd (D-WV), accompanied by fellow Senator Jay Rockefeller (D-WV), takes the Oath of Office for a record ninth consecutive time in the Senate. Also pictured: Vice President Dick Cheney (R).Source: Wikipedia

For a number of reasons, though, it’s difficult for supporters to pretend racism plays any significant role in public opposition to ObamaCare.

Take the following chart from the Huffington Post, which tracks public opinion of Obama’s health care plan over the entire course of his presidency. When Obama took the oath of office in January 2009, the public actually supported his health plan. At around the same time congressional Democrats first translated his plan into legislative language in June 2009, however, the public turned against it.

Obama Health Care Law: Favor/Oppose

Source: Huffington Post/Pollster

Perhaps it took the racists an entire presidential campaign and six months of his presidency before they realized Barack Obama is African-American. Then, once that dawned on them, they figured they had better start rallying against his health plan. But a better explanation might be that lots of Americans were pleased to have our first black president, pleased that he seemed to want to do something to help the uninsured, but then displeased when they got a closer look at what he had in mind.

Likewise, the below chart from the Kaiser Family Foundation shows that the dark-blue states embraced the Affordable Care Act by establishing a health insurance Exchange. States that declined include such racist backwaters as Maine, Wisconsin, Delaware, and the president’s home state of Illinois, which holds the distinction of being the only state to vote for Obama three times.

Source: Kaiser Family Foundation

Progressives and Democrats are no doubt miffed by the ongoing public opposition to their most coveted prize. To ascribe that opposition to racism, however, is itself a form of prejudice.

A charitable, open-minded adult might respond to the public’s rejection of his ideas by re-evaluating them, rather than by taking the self-soothing route of smearing his detractors with charges of racism or guilt by association. Racists aren’t the only people who need to reconsider their priors.

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